The Valley of the Shadow of Death

We have waited for this day with eagerness and trepidation, and now it is here.  We turn the car out of the Homewood Suites parking lot at 4:30am and head to the Duke University Hospital.  It is pitch black and there is not a car on the roads.  We want to be there before they take her to surgery at 5:15 to give her one last kiss before she goes into battle for her life.

On Friday my sister Paula was admitted to the hospital to 'embolize' her cancerous left kidney in preparation for its removal this morning.  The idea is to cut off the kidney's blood supply by blocking the renal artery so the tumor gets no blood.  After about 72 hours they will remove it and there will be much less blood loss we are told.  Unfortunately the tumor has grown into her main vein returning blood to the heart and they also must open her chest, put her on a heart lung bypass machine and remove all the tumor from her vena cava as well.  No small task, and we all are aware of the magnitude of the insult to her body that will happen today.

It doesn't seem possible that only 5 short weeks ago we got the phone call from Paula telling us she had this monster growing inside her.  Much has happened since then, with trips to Duke for consults and scheduling the surgery as well as trying to plan for Paula's recovery.

And now as we silently cover the few miles to the hospital in the darkness, I hear Cecily quietly asking for comfort and protection as we 'pass through the valley of the shadow of death'.  I always wondered about that phrase when I would hear the 23rd psalm as a child.  I couldn't imagine what that was like; I just heard the poetry of the words.  Today, I know.

Now we all are sitting in Paula's room at 5am.  She is dozing off and on.  The last several days have been difficult.  The embolization has caused her some real discomfort and pain since Friday.  The drugs have helped, but it was more than any of us expected. This is the quiet before the storm, and we are gathered around her watching her in the dark.  I step outside with Scott, her son, and we listen as the 6th floor slowly comes to life--people arriving and activity increasing as we stand there.   We look to the left and there is the orderly coming around the corner to take her down to the third floor.  We all stand in the hall while they disconnect her from the IV and monitors and wheel her out into the hall.  We follow behind the bed like some strange silent parade as we make our way to the elevator bank.  The silence is punctuated by the rhythmic sound of the unevenness of the wheels on the tile floors.  All five of us cram into the elevator with Paula and the orderly and we are smiling and trying to find the right words.  When we arrive on the third floor, the orderly tells us to sign in with the waiting room desk and we will be called into the Pre-op room when they have her situated and the preliminary IV is in.  At the desk, they give us one of those beepers with lights that you get at Carrabbas when you go out to eat and tell us that we will be buzzed when they are ready.  Looking to the right I see a waiting room that is over 100 yards long!  Easily the length of a football field!  Comfortable chairs are everywhere, and about a fourth of them are filled already with sleeping adults and children.  The surgical wing at Duke has 36 operating suites and 8 Cardiovascular suites!  The size of this operation is staggering!

Within 10 minutes our buzzer lights up and Ed, Jamie and Scott go in to see Paula.  Cecily and I stay in the waiting room.  We know our turn will come.  After about 15 minutes, Jamie and Scott emerge and Cecily and I go in.  In a bay about a third of the way down a wide hallway is my sister.  Her anesthesiologist introduces himself.  He is a very energetic young man named Jerricola who has already inserted an arterial monitoring line and is about to insert another IV for her anesthesia.  Paula looks so small in the bed.  In January she weighed close to 160 lbs and went on Weight Watchers.  Now she is 125 lbs.  The tumor has sucked so much of her life force from her already.  We can't wait for this thing to be out of her.

The time has come.....they are ready to take her in and one by one we all lean down and have a private moment with Paula.  I look into her eyes and see the fear that has consumed her for the last four weeks.  I smile, kiss her forehead and say, "Be brave, my sweet sister, God is with you--you will prevail!" (I will fear no  evil for thou art with me, thy rod and thy staff will comfort me).  It all makes sense.

So now we are in the waiting room and they are removing the evil from her body.  We are all walking through the valley, and we pray for divine guidance for the surgeon's hands.